Nding wheelchair

ABSTRACT

A wheelchair for lifting a person paralyzed from the midthorasic region down is provided which consists of a wheeled framework mounting parallel rod frame coupled to a seatback frame, the seat frame being actuated by a spring motor which straightens the seat and seatback to a position 10* less than vertical to provide standing support for the paralyzed person.

United States Patent Peter W. Bressler [72] Inventor II N. Derby Ave,Ventnor, NJ. 08604 21 Appl. No. 825,639 [22] Filed May I9, 1969 [45]Patented June 29, 1971 [54] STANDING WHEELCHAIR 8 Claims, 9 DrawingFigs. [52] US. Cl 297/42, 297/330 51] Int. Cl A473 5/00 [50] Field ofSearch 297/42, 44, 330, 316, 335, 324, 323, 332, 313, DIG. 4, 283; 5/66,68

[56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,265,474 5/1918 Mikulic297/283 2971313 2,572,149 10/1951 Hind 4/1952 Everest 297/42 2,672,9173/1954 Collura..... 5/66 3,023,048 2/1962 Banon 297/330 3,081,463 3/1963Williams... 5/68 I 3,107,105 10/1963 Heriford.., 297/42 X 3,138,4026/1964 Heyl 297/330 3,343,871 9/1967 Yates 297/323 3,379,450 4/1968Jones 297/330 UX Primary Examiner-Francis K. Zugel Att0rneyBarlow &Barlow ABSTRACT: A wheelchair for lifting a person paralyzed from themidthorasic region down is provided which consists of a wheeledframework mounting parallel rod frame coupled to a seatback frame, theseat frame being actuated by a spring motor which straightens the seatand seatback to a position 10 less than vertical to provide standingsupport for the paralyzed person.

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INVENTOR PETER W. BRESSLER ATTORNEYS PATENTED JUHZB'IQYI SHLET 2 BF 2FIGS INVENTOR PETER W. BRESSLER ATTORNEYS FIG.3

STANDING WHEELCHAIR BACKGROUND OF THE mvelvrlou There are approximately250,000 disabled persons in the United States today who are unable tofunction unassisted in today's society. A large segment of thishandicapped population that are in wheelchairs are those with variousforms of paraplegia. In cases of this type it is of great physiologicalbenefit for the patient to be able to stand. The upright positionaffords better abdominal organ function, better blood and lymphcirculation, and better muscle vitality in the afflicted limbs. Theweight bearing also inhibits the tendency of calcium rejection causingbone brittleness and atrophy. Today, standing of a patient is achievedthrough great discomfort and inconvenience by strappingrhim to a tilttable or support box where he stands immobile for a variable length oftime. This is really nothing more than an exercise which is expensive,time consuming and uncomfortable.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION A wheelchair framework is fitted with aparallel rod seat and seatback which will maintain the seatbacksubstantially vertical as the seat rises to a standing position whichwill be slightly removed from vertical by a small amount on the order of10 or so to eliminate a patients fear of falling'forward. To

actuate the seat and seatback, a pair of compression springs areutilized, the force from which is applied through a rack and pinionwhich is coupled to the seat. Once the'spring is released and thepatient leans forward, the entiremechanism becomes actuated and the seatand seatback elevate to a near vertical position. The patient ismaintained in position by a knee cushion which would normally engage hislegs just below the knee joints and will keep the immobilized area ofthe pa? tient in position. In addition the wheelchair provides afoot padsystem which drops to the floor as the patient rises with actuation ofthe mechanism so as to provide a firm anchor for the patient when he isstanding.

The standing attitude that is achieved by thewheelchair of the instantinvention places the patient ona correct proportional eye level with hispeers and adds to his self-confidence.

With utilization of the device of the instant invention it is quite 1easy to achieve a standing position without any undue exertion or withthe use of auxiliary devices, such as braces or crutches, and willpermit the personwho has been erected to return to sitting positionmerely by placing pressure in a proper location. The systemincorporates, therefore, the natural motion of standing withoutrequiring outside power source.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is a perspective view of thewheelchair in closed position made in accordance with the invention;

FIG. 2 is a side elevational view partly in section illustrating thewheelchair and its actuating mechanism;

FIG. 3 is a view similar to FIG. 2 with the seat and seatback inelevated position;

FIG. 4 is a sectional view taken on lines 4-4 of FIG. 2showing ingreater detail the spring and its housing for the actuation mechanism;

FIG. 5 is a partial top view partly in section illustrating the seatframe;

FIG. 6 is a detail elevational view of the joint between the seat andthe seatback;

FIG. 7 is an elevational view showing a brake mechanism that may beattached to the wheelchair;

FIG. 8 is a front view of the wheelchair in folded position; and

FIG. 9 is a top view partly in section of the foot pad mounting.

2 DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT Referring to FIG. 1 there isshown a framework consisting of two longitudinal members 11 and 12 towhich vertical members 13 and 14 are affixed. Between the twolongitudinal members 11 and 12 is a spreader bar generally designated 15which is made up of two end sections 16 to which the foot pads areattached and three articulated sections 17, 18 and 19. To thisbasicframework and particularly the longitudinal members 11 and 12,wheels are attached, as for example, large rear driving-wheels 20, 20'which are affixed to the rearward end of the frame members 11 and 12respectively and wheels 22, 22' are castered in a suitable fashion tothe front end of the longitudinal members 11 and 12.

Preferably the longitudinal members 11 and 12 are made from tubularstock. For simplicity the right side of the chair willnow be described,although it is to be understood that the structure is repeated on theleft side. To this end, the member 11 consists of a rear section 11A anda front section 1 1B (see FIGS. 2 and 3). Between these sections thereis telescopingly received the vertical member 13 which is cast inT-shaped fashion so as to provide internal sleeves as at 13A, 13B.Within the vertical casing 13 is a piston 25 of generally invertedcup-shaped form and which has secured to the outer wall thereof a rack26. A motor means in the form of a com pression spring. 28 is receivedwithin the piston recess 27 (FIG. 2) which spring exerts a force betweenthe end wall of the recess and an adjustable stop 29. The adjustablestop is threadingly received-on a threaded shaft 30 that is held inposition by a lock ring 31 (see FIG. 4) and thence passes. through apair of bushings 32, 32' in the walls of the member 13 and thence onoutwardly where a handwheel 33 is affixed to the shaft 30 to rotate thesame. It will be apparent that by rotating the handwheel 33, thecompression of spring. 28 may be varied and in this manner the forceexerted by the spring varies. Preferably the piston 25 is madeself-lubricating within the member 13 by coating the same with plasticmaterial such as PTFE or an equivalent thereof.

It should benoted that a pair of boss plates 13C are located at theupper end of thevertical member 13 and between these? boss plates 13Care located a first arm unit of the seat portion of the frame consistingof a pair of arms, which arms are designated.38, 38 and between the armsis located the gear segment 36. The arms 38, 38' are secured to the gearsegment 36 as by spot welding and by reference to FIG. 5 it will be seenthat the arms and gear assembly is pivoted to the boss plates 13C bypivot pin 39 while trunnions 40, 40' protrude from boss plates 13C intointernal bosses 41 of the arm casing 42. The arm assembly is thereforemade up of the first unit of two lifting arms, which are in effect madepart of the gear, and in addition an outside casing 42 or second armunit, which is pivoted, it will be noted, at another point to the bosses13C. In this manner a parallel arm arrangement is achieved inconjunction with the arm 38 in the outside casing 42 utilizing the twospaced pivot points. 4

At the rearward end of the arms a spacer block 38A is fastened and atthis location the seatback frame 45 is pivoted to the arms 38, 38 bypivot pin 46 (see FIGS. 5 and 6) and is also pivoted to the arm casing42 on trunnions 49. In this manner it will be noted that the couplingbetween the seat and the seatback is a parallelogram type of linkagearrangement, the main parallelogram being formed on the seat itself withcoupling to the seatback at one end of the parallelogram. Thisarrangement insures that as the seat israised from horizontal position,the seatback will extend itself substantially vertical upon fullelevation of the seat portion as illustrated in FIG. 3.

Spreader bars generally designated 47 (FIG. 8) extend between the twohalves of the frame at the juncture of the seat and seatback. To mountthe spreader, a boss 48 with a trunnioned ear portion 48' extends fromthe arm casing 42 and couples into a slot of the first of a plurality ofarticulated sections. This spreader together with spreader 15 giveslateral stability to the structure.

To maintain the chair in a normal attitude some locking means is neededbetween the piston and its casing or in some of the suitable locationwhere relative rotative motion is achieved. A number of locking schemeswill suggest themselves and for simplicity of disclosure I haveillustrated herein a pair of spring-loading locking actuator rods 50(see FIG. 5) in arms 42 which couple to a bellcrank arm 50 pivoted at 50to a part of arm casing 42. At the free end of the bellcrank is alocking pin 56 that passes through boss plate 13C into arm 38'. The rod50 is suitably guided in a housing 51 that contains a compression spring52 and is reciprocated by a lever such as 55 (see FIG. I) to rock thebellcrank and withdraw pin 56 to release the chair for actuation. Itshould be recalled that duplicate structure is provided on the left sideof the unit and thus as the patient leans forward in a normal attitudeto get out of achair which moves his center of gravity forward towardthe pivot 39 and with the two springs in proper compression, this willthen permit the two pistons such as 25 to raise and slowly the seat andseatback will elevate to the position as shown in FIG. 3. The patientwill be maintained from completely falling forward by the slight rearattitude of the seat and seatbackand further by the knee restraintcushion 60 which engages the patient below the knee, bulging outwardupon engagement, with thigh engagement occurring on cushion unit 61.

During this operation the patients pressure on the foot pad assemblygenerally designated 62 (see FIG. 2) will be exerted. As seen moreparticularly in FIG. 1 the foot pads consist of a bottom plate 63 whichis supported in position by parallelogram linkage generally designated64 which linkage is affixed to the part 16 of the stretcher bar atopposite points thereof, for example on ear 66 and welded to point 65.The part 16 of the stretcher bar is a pair of nesting pieces having arecess 67 in which there is located a torsional spring 68 (FIG. 9). Inthis fashion the torsional spring, one end of which is locked to eachpart, is suitably loaded so that the foot pads normally are in theposition as illustrated in FIGS. 1 and 2, but any pressure placedthereon will move in a clockwise direction about the part 16 as viewedin the drawings. To maintain this structure integral a pin 69 passesthrough the outer sleeve and into a circumferential slot in the innerpart.

The chair is maintained in elevated position by the pin 56 passing thrudifferent reception holes in plate 13C and arm 38'. To return the chairto normal attitude, the patient releases the locks and since hisbuttocks are already exerting pressure on the seat cushions to maintainhimself erect, the seat and seatback will thereupon return to nearly theposition of FIG. 1, final down position being obtained by moving thepatients weight .back toward the seatback. The mechanism may then belocked by moving levers 55.

The seat and the seatback are provided with seating cushions consistingof cylindrical members made up of foam with vinyl covers, identicalstructure being used for knee and thigh pads 60, 61. Within these foampieces with vinyl covers generally designated 70, a spring wire 72 islocated having an end part 73 that is preferably of a spring clipconstruction that is adapted to be inserted into a plurality ofapertures such as 75 in the arm casing 42 or the seatback casing 45. Inthis fashion it is relatively easy to telescope the chair for cartage byfirst snapping loose the seat cylinders 70 together with pads 60, 61 andthen moving the spreader bars 15, 47 apart so that the. joints thereofwill articulate and then the whole assembly may be pushed together tothe position as shown in FIG. 8.

For braking purposes of the wheelchair a usual brake linkage may beprovided and affixed for example to the frame member 11, the brakelinkage consisting of a mounting plate with an actuating lever #81pivoted as at 82 to the plate and having a linkage made up of two parts83 and 84 which will move towards the wheel 20 when the lever is movedto the broken line position.

I claim:

1. A wheelchair comprising a frame having a pair of longitudinalmembers, wheels rotatably mounted on said members,

vertical members affixed to the longitudinal members, seat arms pivotedto the vertical members, lateral means extending between and supportedby said arms in all positions of pivoting, seatback frame memberspivoted to the seat arms, motor means in the vertical members operativebetween the frame and the seat arms to elevate the seat arms andcoupling means between the seat arms and vertical members to normallymaintain the seat arms and seatbacksubstantially at to each other andupon elevating the seat arms to relatively rock the seatback andincrease the angle between the seat arms and seatback and provide agenerally continuous generally vertical support.

2. A wheelchair as in claim 1 wherein the seat arms comprise two armunits, the first unit being pivoted to the vertical members and thesecond unit being pivoted to the first on a spaced axis and wherein theseatback frame is pivoted to the first and second arm units on spacedaxes.

3. A wheelchair as in claim 1 wherein the seat arms have a segment of agear secured thereto and the motor means has a rack engaging the gearsegment.

4. A wheelchair as in claim 1 including articulated spreader barsbetween the seat arms and between the longitudinal members.

5. A wheelchair as in claim 4 wherein the spreader bar between thelongitudinal members mounts a pair of foot pad assemblies on tortionallybiased sleeves.

6. A wheelchair as in claim I wherein a knee pad is detachably fastenedbetween the seat arms adjacent the pivot point thereof.

7. A wheelchair as in claim 1 wherein the seating cushions arecylindrical foam filled units detachably secured to the seat arms andseatback frame.

8. A wheelchair as in claim 2 wherein the first arm unit is coupled to asegmental gear and the motor means has a rack engaging the gear.

1. A wheelchair comprising a frame having a pair of longitudinal members, wheels rotatably mounted on said members, vertical members affixed to the longitudinal members, seat arms pivoted to the vertical members, lateral means extending between and supported by said arms in all positions of pivoting, seatback frame members pivoted to the seat arms, motor means in the vertical members operative between the frame and the seat arms to elevate the seat arms and coupling means between the seat arms and vertical members to normally maintain the seat arms and seatback substantially at 90* to each other and upon elevating the seat arms to relatively rock the seatback and increase the angle between the seat arms and seatback and provide a generally continuous generally vertical support.
 2. A wheelchair as in claim 1 wherein the seat arms comprise two arm units, the first unit being pivoted to the vertical members and the second unit being pivoted to the first on a spaced axis and wherein the seatback frame is pivoted to the first and second arm units on spaced axes.
 3. A wheelchair as in claim 1 wherein the seat arms have a segment of a gear secured thereto and the motor means has a rack engaging the gear segment.
 4. A wheelchair as in claim 1 including articulated spreader bars between the seat arms and between the longitudinal members.
 5. A wheelchair as in claim 4 wherein the spreader bar between the longitudinal members mounts a pair of foot pad assemblies on tortionally biased sleeves.
 6. A wheelchair as in claim 1 wherein a knee pad is detachably fastened between the seat arms adjacent the pivot point thereof.
 7. A wheelchair as in claim 1 wherein the seating cushions are cylindrical foam filled units detachably secured to the seat arms and seatback frame.
 8. A wheelchair as in claim 2 wherein the first arm unit is coupled to a segmental gear and the motor means has a rack engaging the gear. 